January 2015

January is always that time of year when it's too cold to do anything, but some how we stay really busy. This winter has been surprisingly a little warmer. We haven't had much snow, which could mean a very dry summer. Not looking forward to that. I have been busy doing homework most weekends. I am currently taking Math 1050 and Music 1010. Music isn't too bad, but math takes a lot of time to stay on top of it and not get behind.

With this warmer weather we are looking forward to camping season. We can't wait to get out of the house and spend some time in mountains. We are planning our summer vacation to Glacier National Park in Montana and Waterton National Park in Canada. We are all looking forward to that road trip.

Painting Maisie's Room

I had decided several months ago to paint and re-decorate Maisie's room for her birthday. It was hard keeping this a secret and putting her off. She has been begging to redo her room for months. I had to make up every excuse in the book to put her off. She would get upset with me and not understand why we just couldn't start buying a few things here and there. She was constantly looking at things online and getting ideas on how she wanted to decorate it. I took all her interests into consideration when coming up with a plan. On Friday, December 19th we headed over to Kyle and Misty's, so she could stay the night with her cousin Maddy. We met them at a church house and watched Maddy & Peyton perform at their piano recital. Than Parker and I headed home to get working on her room. I waited until the drive home to tell Parker what I would be doing, cause I knew he would not be able to keep a secret. We didn't get home until about 7:30. I realized a couple of days prior that I needed to get started on repainting the headboard or there would be no way it would get all the coats of paint and be dry. The headboard was a laminate one that we had in the basement. I had to put two coats of primer, two coats of paint, and then two coats of acrylic. I managed to get the two coats of primer on before Friday night. When we got home I put one coat of paint on the headboard and then started on her room. The thing that always takes the longest is taping. I was able to get her room painted by midnight. Saturday morning, I put one coat of acrylic on the headboard and then started putting her room together. I had to switch out the beds and move furniture around. She wanted the full size bed that was in the basement. I spent most of Saturday morning getting everything in place. I kept Misty updated through text. It was so fun seeing it come together. The girls really wanted me to go shopping with them, so I busted my butt and was done by a little after 1. Parker kept saying, "Mom, Maisie better like this, cause it is a lot of work." It was a lot of work, but totally worth it.

Parker stayed with the boys at Kyle's house and then all the girls headed to Ogden. The one thing I needed to get was envelopes for my Christmas cards. When I had picked them up the week before, I forgot to ask for my envelopes. We went to Costco, JcPenney, and Sear's. I really wanted to try and be back home before Eric left for work so he could see Maisie's reaction. We missed him by a few seconds. He was pulling out of the drive-way as we were pulling in. It worked out fine, cause I caught her reaction on camera and was able to show him. She could not understand why I was in such a hurry to get home. Parker had a hard time keeping it a secret. He kept trying to tell her that she needed to open her present when we got home. She said she didn't want to, cause her birthday wasn't until tomorrow. I put a Birthday banner across her door and when she saw the banner she still had no clue what as going on. She opened her door and screamed. She couldn't believe that I did all that work in one day. She kept saying it was the best birthday present ever. It was totally worth it. I was a little worried that she might be upset that she wasn't involved, but she said she loved that I surprised her.

 

She got the Live, Laugh, Love wall hangings for Christmas.

 

She got the cube shelf for Christmas.

 

December 12, 2014

Me and the kids had a dentist appointment. It took longer than we thought, because Dr. Gunnell decided to start a crown on me. We didn't leave until 5:30. Maisie was getting mad at me because we had invited the family to go to the Cache Valley Fun Park to get together and celebrate Maisie's 12 birthday. We got there just before 6:00 and didn't leave until almost 10:00. Shanna & Kyle's family joined us. The kids had a great time bowling, skating, and playing on the soft play. They could have stayed there all night. We definitely need to do this more often. Madison came home with us and stayed the night.

Saturday, December 13th - I got up early and went to Weight Watchers. The girls came with because they wanted to go shopping afterwards. Maisie looks forward to Saturday's when we go to WW and then go grocery shopping afterwards. We ended up at Wal-mart, Sam's, Shopko, and the Mall. Maisie was trying to find some cute skinny jeans, but her cute little butt has a hard time finding pants that fit her just right. I decided to make a quick little trip to Ogden to pick up my Christmas cards and Costco. Well of course on the way down, I add a few more stores to my list. We went to Pet Smart, Costco, Gordman's, and Target and then met Kyle and Misty in Brigham at Wal-mart to pass Maddie on. I was trying to so hard to get home. I always feel so guilty leaving Eric home by himself on weekends when he isn't working. I thought I was crazy. Him and Parker had a grand old time hanging out. They took a little drive up Hardware Ranch and attending the Elk Festival. We were gone from 8:30 to about 5:00. I cooked a quick dinner and then we relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Sunday, December 14th, I took pictures of the most adorable baby girl. It was very ironic that a friend of mine set up the appointment for her sister-in-law as a gift. The sister-in-law ended up being the girl who cleaned my teeth at the dentist. We got to visit and get to know each other before the photo shoot. Aria was such a good baby and we got some great shots and I can't wait to share them with mom.  We then spent most of the day hanging out with Jerry and Sallie. We went over to their house and watched one football game and then we moved over to our house and ate sweet pork burritos and watched the late football game. We had a great weekend.

December 1, 2014

I took my Math final on Monday, December 1st. I did awesome. My final grade for the exam was 95%. I couldn't believe I did so well and am so proud of all my hard work. I am officially done with school until January 7th. Yippeee. I pulled two A's this semester and holding my 4.0 gpa strong. We will see how long I can keep it up. So far, I haven't had too hard of classes. No science or history yet.

November 2014

Life has been so busy. I feel like all I do is homework and I don't get to do anything else. I am grateful that I get to go to school, but the rest of my life seems to be chaos. As long as I have my weekends to work on homework, I seem to manage okay, but as soon as something comes up on the weekend, it goes crazy.

I took my third Math exam on Tuesday, November 18th. I got a 97% on this exam. I was so excited. I guess when you take your time and are not overly confident you do much better on the exams.

We spent Thanksgiving with my family this year. I think Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. We get to enjoy yummy food and good company. I was feeling really guilty about wanting to go Black Friday shopping this year, cause I feel like it is taking the true meaning of Thanksgiving away. When I mentioned this to Maisie she said, "but mom, it's tradition for you to go shopping and for use to stay at grandma's." I guess as long as she is okay with this tradition than we are good. The kids do enjoy spending the night at my mom's. I am so grateful that she is willing to take on the challenge of watching all the grand kids.

Shanna and I went out shopping. It was so good to spend time with her. We haven't got to hang out in a long time. We started at Wal-mart and then went to Shopko, JcPenney's, Best Buy, and then back to Wal-mart. We got home about 12:30. Kelsey was waiting up for us, since we got her a new cell phone. She was very excited.

I picked up my kids the next morning and then we headed home. Eric had gone home the night before. He is not a shopper.

The rest of the weekend I spent doing homework. I am trying really hard to get everything done by the first of December so I can have 5 weeks off of school. I finished my FCHD class and studied for my Math final.

Muzzle Loader Elk Hunt/Halloween

October 28th - Eric worked the weekend on grave yards and was off for almost 2 weeks for the muzzle loader elk hunt. He left Tuesday, October 28th and headed over to my dad's to help them get ready. They went to their usual hunting spot up Causey. They have such a great time spending time together. Eric was gone until Wednesday, November 5th. It felt like forever. Having no contact with him was the hardest. I felt like a single mom. Me and the kids got sick and didn't do a whole lot. We realized Eric is the "glue" keeps us together and running smoothly. It seems like every year while he is hunting we get sick. It was so nice to have him home. 

For Halloween I left work a little early so that we would have time to make it over to Bear River City's trunk-or-treat. It was really nice having Halloween on a Friday this year. We didn't have to worry about getting home early to go to school and work the next day. The kids had a great time trick-or-treating and spending time with their cousins.

Eric hunting

Sunday, October 26th we decided to go hunting as a family. We woke up early and headed up Logan Canyon. We were on the mountain before any one that was camping got up. We didn't see much, just a few doe's. It was still fun getting out and enjoying time with the family.